Transfusing an Rh neg with Rh pos pRBC's

[J Schuler]

I have worked at a couple large facilities with very different policies on transfusing Rh positive blood to Rh negative patients. One facility routinely gave Rh positive blood to Rh negative females not of child bearing age and of course, males. The other gave Rh positive only when a minimum level of Rh negative blood was available. The facility I work at now basically will never give Rh postive to Rh negative individuals even in a crunch. If they have to it seems it is only approved for traumas. I am looking for some real life experiences as far as how many patients really do develop anti-D. The texts all seem to say the percentage is pretty high. I would also like to find out what different facilities policies are on this subject. Thanks for your help.

[rcurrie]

We transfused Rh positive blood to Rh negative patients (traumas only) about 10 times last year, usually 2-4 units each. No one made anti-D. I used to have 2 O pos on each of my helicopters, and everyone (male, female, and unknowns) got O pos. But, our levels are up, so it is 2 O negs on the choppers for now. Our O neg supply is hovering at around 100 units now, so everyone gets O neg while it lasts. We will change our policy to O pos for males if we drop below 50 units of O neg on the shelf.

BC